I would hold off on the banana.....tender perennial there. I just planted a Desert Willow and it was an iffy decision. If we have a hard winter with low temps I may lose it. Depends on the tree really, tropicals like banana I would wait until spring. Doc, I don't know where the university area is in Tucson but there are two nurseries there that I like. Mesquite Valley Growers - Speedway and Pantano and Desert Survivors on Starr Pass near I-10. Desert Survivors is run by disabled vets who start lots of native trees, bushes, plants. Mesquite Valley is very upscale. If you want cactus plants you cannot miss with Bach's Cactus Nursery, Thornydale north of Cortaro Farms. HTH.

I maintain a local volunteer museum cottage garden downtown Calistoga, which is still a learning experience after 10 years. The front garden faces south east with a large expanse of blacktop which draws heat like a magnet. Most of our visitor traffic is in the summer so keeping the garden colorful through the summer is important. Last week I took out the primroses that lasted well through the winter and replaced with Lantana, well rooted in one gallon containers. Two containers, three gallon, flanking the stairway which contained Ranunculus(which fried there)I replaced with "purple dome asters"that had been cut back once to keep more compact. I am trying this year for the first time Phlox paniculata planted a month ago, which so far is holding up to the heat. Roses do well if I can keep up with the dead heading, the only one to get black spot is a David Austin variety. An old fashioned rose red peony does well while a white one sunburns badly. Summer planting is not impossible, just difficult. Al

Hi, I'm 9b and have had success with Bok Choi, Rapini, Broccoflower and regular Broccoli, as well as Fennel. I try to do continual plantings and stagger the start times by about a month. It also works well for the Rapini and Brocolli types if you just chop off what you want for that harvest and let the plant keep producing. I have extra Rapini and Brocoflower seeds if you would like some? Elizabeth

You could plant almost anything that's not eggplant, peppers, squash or such like, the hot weather plants. I have planted tomatoes this early in the past, under glass jugs, and it snowed on them (May 7, Mother's day that year) they were fine, just the effort did not produce tomatoes much earlier. Memorial day is the traditional planting date for these, I still cover eggplant and squash with remay for a couple of weeks for added warmth and bug protection. All herbs with the exception of basil would be fine now. Parsley, cilantro, sorrel, loveage, (my chervil lived through this past winter) all onions. I can't think of any green things that would have trouble now, lettuces, kales, peas and sweet peas went in a couple of weeks ago, arrugula is well up. They say corn can be planted when the oak leaves are the size of a mouse ear. I've always loved that image.